Finlaggan

Finlaggan from
the Approach Path

Two miles south west of Port
Askaig, a well signposted single track road heads
north for a mile to Finlaggan. Here you find a car park outside the excellent
Finlaggan Visitor Centre, while off to one side a gate gives access to a track
that descends over fields to a wooden walkway leading to Eilean Mor, an island
in Loch Finlaggan, on which you find the remains of a number of buildings. A
second, inaccessible, island stands a little beyond the first.

Finlaggan is an enormously important place in the history of the
Highlands and Islands of Scotland. During most of the 1300s and 1400s it formed
the administrative centre of the
Lordship of the
Isles, which during this period governed a large part of the western
seaboard of Scotland. The Lords of the Isles
nominally governed on behalf of the Scottish Crown, but in practice exercised
considerable independence: a state of affairs that came to a halt 1493 when the
4th (and final) Lord of the Isles,
John MacDonald II had
his titles stripped from him by
King James III.

The origins of settlement on and around Loch Finlaggan appear to
date back to the iron age. In the first half of the 600s a monastic community
was established on Eilean Mor, the larger of the islands in the loch. This was
either dedicated to, or just possibly founded by, St Findlugan, an Irish monk
and a contemporary of St
Columba.

From the early 800s onwards, the Hebrides came under the increasing
influence of the Norse. It was only in 1158 that they were ousted (and then not
for good), by Somerled, who had
been born of mixed Norse and Gaelic parentage. He was able to declare himself
King of Man and King of the Isles and came close to establishing a separate
kingdom, independent of both Norway and Scotland. This effectively ended when
Somerled, was killed in 1164 by
the forces of Malcolm
IV. One of his sons, Angus Mor Mac Donald, founded Clan MacDonald and was
appointed Lord of Islay by the Norwegian
King Håkon IV. Four
generations later, in the middle decades of the 1300s, one of Angus's
descendents, John of Islay,
managed to gain control over much of the area previously ruled by
Somerled. He did so, however,
not as a king, but as the self-styled "Lord of the Isles", nominally paying
homage to the Scottish Crown: and he cemented his links with that Crown by
marrying the daughter of King Robert II.

It seems possible that it was
John of Islay, the 1st Lord
of the Isles, who established a settlement on the two islands at the northern
end of Loch Finlaggan, the larger Eilean Mor (or "big island") and the smaller
Eilean na Comhairle (or "council island"), though it may have been one of his
predecessors as Lord of Islay. Why a lord governing a realm dependant on naval
power should have chosen some islands on an inland loch to govern it from is
not immediately obvious. The answer may lie in the historical memory of St
Findlugan's Monastery on Eilean Mor, which was perhaps believed to mark it out
as a special place. And Finlaggan, as it became known, was not that far from
the head of Loch Indall. Here the lord's birlinns, the fighting ships of the
time, descended from Viking longships, could be pulled up on the beach.

Whatever the reason, the two islands came to support to a thriving
and bustling community. Eilean na Comhairle, whose origins date back to a broch
built in the loch in the iron age, became home to a stone castle. This was
served by jetties, but was also linked by a causeway to the larger Eilean Mor.
Here there was a great hall, a chapel (possibly on the site of the monastery
founded six centuries earlier) and other accommodation, plus ranges of service
buildings of the sort usually associated with a lordly residence. The ruin of
the chapel stills stands on Eilean Mor, but other remains on the island largely
date back to a homestead which existed here in the 1600s.

There are two distinct elements to any visit to Finlaggan. The
superb visitor centre is open seasonally (see links on right) and offers a well
thought out insight into the world of the
Lords of the Isles
and a home to many of the impressive and beautiful artefacts which have been
unearthed at Finlaggan during archaeological investigation in recent decades.
Here you can find the head of a beautifully carved cross. Elsewhere there is
part of a grave slab with very clear carvings of a sword and a birlinn. One end
of the centre is home to a tableau of
Donald, 2nd Lord of the
Isles signing a charter which has survived to this day. Here, too, is a
full size padded tunic or aketon, intended to provide the wearer with some
protection in combat, or be worn under armour.

There are some extremely nice touched in the visitor centre. The
reception desk, for example, is in the form of a longship. And one window sill
supports a model of Eilean Mor in a position that allows a direct comparison to
be made between the model and the view of the island through the window.

Eilean Mor itself is open at any time. We approached it with great
expectations, but found that for us it didn't quite live up to them. There is
no shortage of interpretation boards showing you what you are looking at, but
perhaps the overlay of later buildings on the island detracts from the sense of
it having been so closely tied with the
Lords of the Isles.
For us the main disappointment was the way a nice collection of medieval grave
slabs has been displayed in the remains of the chapel. The slabs are laid flat
and protected from the elements by clear covers: which means that your chance
of actually seeing the detail is lost in reflections of the sky. As the grave
slabs don't appear to be in their original locations, it might have been better
for them to be displayed leaning against a wall, under a small shelter
protecting them from the elements, as tends to be done at sites in the care of
Historic Environment Scotland.